


Bloody Bandaids

by thefrogg



Series: Abandoned Works from LJ [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: BDSM, Hurt/Comfort, Knifeplay, M/M, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-04
Updated: 2013-03-04
Packaged: 2017-12-04 06:14:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/707455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefrogg/pseuds/thefrogg
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam figures out what Dean needs, and insists on being the one to give it to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Betaed by fluffnutter.

In the end, it was the holy water that betrayed Dean.

Not the frantic post-close call fucking, savage and brutal. Sam could blame that on adrenaline, the need to reassure themselves and each other they were still alive. Always back at the motel, all urgent hands and sharp teeth, grappling in the sheets for dominance. Often in the backseat of the Impala, a tangled mass of limbs, all straining towards relief, or wedged into the passenger seat in the front, no room to do anything but burn each other with the friction. A few memorable times, one or the other of them bent over the hood, hobbled by jeans and boxer-briefs peeled halfway down his thighs, just waiting, waiting to be fucked stupid. But the worst, the times that left them as injured in celebration as in the hunt, they never made it out of the woods, or the house, or wherever the case had taken them. Those times, they rutted in the dirt, on the floor, a couch if they were lucky, the scent of salt and burn and blood and dust heavy in their lungs, skin slick with blood and slime as much as sweat and sex.

Sam didn't want to think about those times, because it was always Dean that ended up bruised just shy of broken.

It certainly wasn't the way Dean would close his eyes, jaw clenched, and lean _in_ to the stitches, press harder against the alcohol-soaked washcloth to increase the burn. That was all Dean, all unspoken answer to their usual mocking insult, "Don't be such a pussy."

The simple fact that Dean got aroused at the same time, now that? That was just because half the time they managed to do the patching before they succumbed to their lust for each other, and the rest of the time, the cataloguing of injuries only brought on a second adrenaline rush.

The holy water, though, Sam couldn't blame on anything else.

Because why would Dean drink holy water instead of drowning himself in whiskey? Poker burns were nasty. Painful, even on the Winchester scale of injuries.

Sam forced himself not to respond, and just to keep tending to Dean's injuries, thankful this had become rote. He was asking the wrong question here, and had known it even as it popped into his brain.

Not 'Why would Dean drink holy water', but 'why would Dean keep two all-but-identical flasks for holy water and whiskey?'

Sam wasn't sure who he wanted to hit: himself, or his brother.

Because there was only one answer to that question.

Actually, he'd be better off hitting himself. Dean would probably enjoy it too much.

~~~

Sam's niggling suspicion turned into a deeply rooted anger as he watched Dean the next morning. Once his older brother had stretched out, taken a hot shower, he was boneless, all hazy green eyes and easy smiles.

Like he'd just spent the night being fucked through the mattress, and not tortured by a bunch of inbred X-Files rejects.

Sam let it slide during breakfast, watched as Dean flirted an extra cinnamon roll from the waitress. The fear and anger churned in his gut, killing his own appetite and making him irritable and snappish.

Dean noticed, tried getting him to open up with a casual, "Hey, what's up with you?" out on the road, gaze flicking back and forth between I-35 and Sam's sullen pout.

"Just drive," Sam shot back, earning a worried look.

"You gonna just sit there and sulk all day? Cause whatever crawled up inside your ass and died is getting real old."

"Just. Drive." Sam shut his eyes, trying to sleep despite the simmering rage, trying to at the very _least_ block out his brother's concern.

Dean gave him a few minutes' respite, then turned down the radio to almost nothing. "Did something happen that you're not telling me? Cause I know you weren't pissed at me before--"

"Not while you're driving. So get to wherever the hell we're going. Please." And Sam shut his eyes, scrunched himself closer to the door.

"You are going to talk to me then, right?"

"Whatever."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Bitch."

"Jerk."

The resigned affection was reassuring. Somehow.

~~~

They'd checked into another seedy motel, salted the door and window and set the wards before Dean scraped up the balls to confront Sam again. "So. You're the one who always wants to talk this stuff out, Sammy. Here I am, don't let it go to waste."

"You were drinking holy water."

Dean blinked.

"Holy. Water," Sam repeated.

"And?"

Sam huffed, anger sparking his eyes as he turned. "Holy water, Dean, not whiskey, not beer, you didn't even take the damn pain pills. How long were you going to hide this from me? Forever? Until you got yourself killed?"

"What the hell are you talking about, Sammy? What do you think I'm hiding from you?" Dean's eyes were wide, guileless, sheened with unshed tears.

"You like pain. I should have seen it sooner, should have--I don't know, done _something."_

"Wha--" It came out breathy, more of a squeak Dean would forever deny than a real protest. "What the hell are you _talking_ about?!"

"This!" And Sam took the few steps between them, raising one hand to poke Dean's shoulder, fingers finding the brand beneath the layered shirts and bandages unerringly.

Dean pulled away with a hiss, curling sideways to protect the injury. "Damnit, Sam, that hurts!"

Sam nodded. "Yeah, I know. It should. And you were enjoying the hell out of it last night."

Dean blinked.

"Holy water."

"So what? So I was thirsty." Dean shrugged, hissing again as it pulled at the wound.

"So how many times have you gotten hurt because you wanted it, Dean? How many times have you thrown yourself recklessly at something?" Sam only paused for a quick breath. "Letting yourself get hurt, on purpose, because you _like_ it is going to get you killed!"

"Man, listen to yourself! We get hurt on the hunt all the time, it's part of the job." Dean shook his head.

"No, not like this. I'm not going to let you get yourself, or me, or somebody else hurt or killed because you're too injured to do anything about it."

"So, what, you're going to beat me up every once in a while? How's that going to solve anything?"

Sam whipped out a knife and turned the blade so it gleamed. "I have a knife. And I know how to use it." Flipping the blade in his hand, he watched as Dean's pupils dilated, nostrils flaring in interest, and paused to let his words sink in. "You can have all the pain you want, as long as it's not out there where it can get somebody killed, okay?"

Dean stood there staring, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides for a long moment before he turned and paced the room. "I don't know why were even talking about this--"

"We're talking about this because it's something you need, and it's too dangerous for you to get it out there, Dean." 

"Can we like, not talk about this? Let it go? Listen, we'll just-"

"No, Dean, _you_ listen." Sam flung his arm sideways, the knife flying to embed itself in the side of the mattress. "You were out there hunting, without me, without Dad, and you know damn well that you can't trust something like this to strangers, I don't know how you survived this long."

"Yeah, well, I did."

Sam snorted. "You wanna know why I left college? Why I agreed to come with you and find Dad?"

"Oh, let me see. Jessica died, just like Mom did. Dad--"

Sam grabbed Dean by front of his shirt and slammed him into the wall. "Because you asked me to. Because you needed me to." He shook his brother, lifting him off his feet momentarily. "Now you need me to do this for you, and you won't take it seriously enough to even ask me."

Dean shut his eyes, unable to hide his body's reaction.

"You like that, don't you?" Sam ground his hips into Dean's, using his full bodyweight to pin his brother against the wall.

"And what are you going to do about it?" Dean ground out between clenched teeth.

"I'm going to tell you what the rules are. And then I'm going to let you go, and we're going to go to sleep. And you can give me your answer before we go on the next hunt. You got that?" And Sam shook Dean again, knocking his head against the wall.

"You little cocktease, you."

Sam ignored the insult. "Just giving you a little something to think about."

Dean just glared.

"Now. Safe and caution words rule. You pick them before we do anything, and I mean _anything._ If you want me to tie you up, I'll tie you up. I won't blindfold you unless you ask me to, specifically. I can and will use the knife on you--nothing that requires stitches. Nothing that'll scar. Salt, alcohol and lemon juice. Afterwards, you let me patch everything up, but I don't think you'll be in any condition to protest. Anything else, you negotiate." Sam stared into Dean's dazed eyes, waiting for the shock to dissipate. "Oh, and just in case I didn't make it clear? Safewords rule. Got that?"

A choked laugh escaped Dean. "Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, I didn't know you had it in you."

"Yeah, well, let's just say you aren't the first person I've ever done this for." 

There was a lingering bitterness behind that statement Dean didn't want to dig into. "Understood," Dean managed, eyes rolling back, unable to stop himself. "John and Impala. Don't want you thinking I'm not trying to warn you if something like demon comes flying out of my mouth."

Sam's lips twitched at the sudden capitulation, but he nodded and let go, Dean sliding halfway to the floor before he managed to catch himself. "Get some sleep."

"What, you're just going to leave me like this?" Dean muttered, popping the button on his jeans to give his dick some breathing space.

"Suck it up, Dean. I told you, I wanted you to have some incentive to think about this." Sam paused by the bed to strip down to his undershirt and boxer-briefs.

"What, did the fact that I gave you my safewords not answer your question?"

"Yeah, Dean, it did. Which is why I said to get some sleep," Sam reminded him, sliding beneath the covers. "We have a long drive tomorrow."

"Why, where are we going? You said you hadn't found--"

"California."

"Okay." Dean blinked, then shook himself like a dog shedding water. "What're we hunting there?"

Sam lifted his head from his pillow to raise a sardonic eyebrow at him. "My toybox."


	2. Chapter 2

The storage depot was the same as he'd left it, a little more run down, the paint flaking off a little more. Sam climbed out of the Impala, slammed the door behind him, and looked up towards the roof, shielding his eyes from the sun before turning back. "You comin' in or not?"

"You have a storage locker."

Sam cocked his head, eyes rolling. "More like a workshop, but, whatever. Now come on." He turned and sauntered away from the car, leaving Dean to curse under his breath and hurry to follow.

They made their way down too-quiet hallways, the light dim and filtering through ever-present dust. Finally Sam stopped in front of a door of chicken wire and metal pipes, a layer of fine mesh on the inside an obvious attempt at additional security.

The lock stuck. It took several tries and mild swearing for Sam to jimmy it open, but finally it did, and Sam stopped Dean from setting off the traps before he could disarm them.

Dean just snorted, waiting patiently for Sam to beckon him inside. "What is all this? You had a dorm --"

"And I couldn't keep anything there, not...really. And there was just some stuff I couldn't keep around Jessie. Too many questions."

Waiting for Sam to fumble open the inner door, Dean looked around at the sleek black metal cabinets, the dusty open shelves. "Mind if I look around?"

Sam gave him a floppy hand-wave, the tinny rattle of the door offering indifferent punctuation.

The first cabinet had nothing interesting, old textbooks, boxes of papers, binders of who-knew-what schoolwork. The second wasn't much better.

The third though--

"Sammy, what the hell are you doing with all this ammunition?" Rows of boxes stared back at him, stacks of silver, stacks of shotgun shells (marked with white x's for salt-packed), rounds for the .45, extra clips. Enough to wage a small war.

"Just because I stopped hunting things, didn't mean that things stopped hunting me. And I told you, I couldn't keep this stuff at the dorm." Sam's voice was heavy with grief and regret.

Jessica. Always Jessica.

Dean shut the cabinet, skipping the other two to join his brother. "You were a closeted hunter? And you let us believe you walked away?"

Sam's shoulders hunched. "I didn't _do_ anything. I just -- I kept it for comfort. So I could be ready. So...so I'd have something to offer you and Dad if you needed help," he finally whispered. "All of this?" He waved at the wall display of knives, from scalpel to an honest-to-god katana, the rack of guns, the maps and drawings and scribbled sigils posted with thumbtacks and tape. "I couldn't even use it to protect myself at home, I had to sneak out and come here."

"To your workshop," Dean finished dully.

Sam rubbed one hand along the scarred tabletop, idly picking up a spool of wire to play with. "I wanted out. But...you know, you know it's impossible to unknow things. I couldn't forget. I couldn't expose everyone around me to what I knew," and he choked on the words, rubbed his cheek before continuing. "Hell, my boyfriend freaked just because I had a bunch of knives at the dorms --"

"Wait, boyfriend?"

A bitter laugh echoed through the room. "You're really...not listening to me. How do you think I learned how to use these things," and steel flashed into Sam's hand, then vanished, "for anything other than killing?"

"And he freaked."

Sam shrugged, dropping the wire and turning to a locked chest. "It's one thing to have a couple of pocket knives, a dive knife, a switchblade. Quite another to have...that." 

Dean eyed Sam's knife collection; it looked fine to him, but then, he was a hunter. He wasn't exactly able to give an objective opinion. "So, what, he thought you were a nutcase?"

Sam refused to look at him. "Serial killer. Or something."

"Jesus, Sammy."

Sam flashed him a twisted smile. "Water under the bridge. Lemme get what we came here for and we can go."

Dean fidgeted at the reminder and cleared his throat. "Ya know..."

"Ye-es?" Sam didn't look at him, just unlocked the chest with practiced fingers, hinges protesting with a soft creak as the lid lifted.

"I don't need this now," Dean said softly.

"I know." Dean's gaze was hot across Sam's shoulders, confused and vulnerable. "I'm not leaving it until it becomes a problem again."

"So, what then? I have to get sharing and caring all over again?" The words came slowly, stiffly.

Sam didn't answer right away, instead taking a small duffel out of the chest and shoving items into it. "You don't have to say anything, or talk to me, or ask for it. Ever, if that's not what you want."

"Then..." The word shook, echoing off the concrete walls, trembling on the verge of a profound and delicate balance.

"Either you give me some kind of signal I can understand, or I'll use my own judgement."

~~~

According to the hunting calendar, it was two werewolves, a woman in white, a poltergeist and a vengeful spirit before Dean started getting twitchy; three and a half weeks by the Julian. Dean could feel Sam watching him, his attention growing more intense as the days passed. He'd never been so aware of his own hunger before, never conscious of how being thrown into a wall went from simple pain to pain-and-underlying-pleasure, then pain-and-goddamned-relief.

And there was Sam's quasi-threat to deal with.

The last of the bruises from the poltergeist had faded to sickly yellow, the lingering stiffness gone by the time they were on their way to a suspected haunting in Michigan. There was nothing left for him to feed off of, nothing to keep the hunger in check.

~~~

Another crappy motel room. Salt lines laid down, wards cast, research covering the table, weapons at the ready.

Sam was taking a shower.

Dean fingered his talisman, the sculpted metal warm beneath his fingers. Knowing Sam wouldn't wait too much longer for him, and that his willpower wouldn't be enough for this next hunt, he swallowed hard and unfastened the leather cord. A few careful movements put three loose knots in the cord, then set it on the bag on Sam's bed.

Research gave him an altogether necessary, and entirely inadequate, distraction while he waited, muscles trembling in a mix of fear and anticipation.

Dean couldn't remember anything he'd read by the time the water shut off; he forced himself to relax and slow his breathing before the door opened.

Sam didn't even pause when he saw the necklace; he just moved it to the side table. "Go take a shower. I left you some hot water."

Fighting the urge to swallow, Dean shut the laptop, then got up and did as he was told.


End file.
